Walters Art Museum Illuminated Manuscripts
Book of Hours, Crucifixion, Walters Manuscript W.721, fol. 86v
This pocket-size Book of Hours was completed for Use of Rome ca. 1450 and was illuminated under the influence of the artists of the Turin-Milan Hours and the Masters of the Gold Scrolls. There are thirteen extant miniatures (inserted), typological border themes, and drolleries. While the extant miniatures exhibit elegance and technical mastery, the figural decoration in the borders is marked in its contrast. However, the collaborating artists seem to have taken a certain amount of delight in the adjoining drolleries. The book itself has seen heavy use, and its original male owner is depicted with an inscribed scroll in the lower border at the first extant illuminated opening on fol. 17r. His image is possibly conflated with that of Lazarus on fol. 35v, and he can be seen depicted in borders throughout the manuscript. The majority of female saints in the litany suggests Franciscan and Francophile sympathies. The Book of Hours features calendar additions that indicate Spanish ownership in the second half of the fifteenth century, and it was rebound in Spain in the nineteenth century.
To explore fully digitized manuscripts with a virtual page-turning application, please visit Walters Ex Libris.
Book of Hours, Crucifixion, Walters Manuscript W.721, fol. 86v
This pocket-size Book of Hours was completed for Use of Rome ca. 1450 and was illuminated under the influence of the artists of the Turin-Milan Hours and the Masters of the Gold Scrolls. There are thirteen extant miniatures (inserted), typological border themes, and drolleries. While the extant miniatures exhibit elegance and technical mastery, the figural decoration in the borders is marked in its contrast. However, the collaborating artists seem to have taken a certain amount of delight in the adjoining drolleries. The book itself has seen heavy use, and its original male owner is depicted with an inscribed scroll in the lower border at the first extant illuminated opening on fol. 17r. His image is possibly conflated with that of Lazarus on fol. 35v, and he can be seen depicted in borders throughout the manuscript. The majority of female saints in the litany suggests Franciscan and Francophile sympathies. The Book of Hours features calendar additions that indicate Spanish ownership in the second half of the fifteenth century, and it was rebound in Spain in the nineteenth century.
To explore fully digitized manuscripts with a virtual page-turning application, please visit Walters Ex Libris.